God makes all things work!

"And we know that in all things God works for the good of those who love him, who have been called according to his purpose."   ~Romans 8:28


After finishing up day #2 in Madrid, it is so obvious to me that God really does work all things together for the good of those to who love Him.  He keeps proving His faithfulness again and again.  Things just keep falling into place right in front of me and Bree.


Our flights were great, no long layovers or delays.  We arrived at the airport and instead of making us fill out a bunch of paperwork or interrogating us to let us into the country, the officials just stamped our passports and that's it!  We exchanged some money into euros while we waited for our luggage and our suitcases were some of the first ones to come out.  Then we headed through the door that said "Aduanas/Customs" and walked right through and ended up outside the airport!  We were pretty confused by that.  Then we found a long line of taxis outside waiting to take us to our destination.  The taxi drove us right to Universidad Complutense de Madrid.  


While on campus, we looked for the building we are supposed to register for classes in, dragging our suitcases with us.  We had some fun adventures (one might including dragging our suitcases over a broken fence, up a hill, through some bushes and through some mud to come to the back of our correct building--we got some funny looks coming up from the bushes with our suitcases).  Then we registered for classes and I found out I only have class on Wednesdays and Thursdays, which should leave me plenty of time to work on my thesis and still enjoy Spain!


Then we ate in the school cafeteria (Bocadillo de manchego y patatas bravas, Mmmm...) and headed to the metro station to find our hostel.  At the metro station we found a photo booth that takes passport sized photos that we need for each of our classes, which was a nice surprise.  We bought a 10 trip metro pass and easily found our way to the station nearest our hostel.  


From the metro station we walked straight to the hostel and checked in.  The place is pretty nice and we have met lots of great people, not bad for 12 euros a night.  We walked down Fuencarral street which had lots of little shops and restaurants.  Then we bought a frozen pizza after refusing to pay the prices we saw at the restaurants and brought it back to the hostel to cook it.


We piddled around on the internet for a few hours while we waited until it was late enough to go to sleep.  Then we went to bed around 10pm and slept until about 10am.


We got up this morning and looked up directions to a few places we wanted to see on our way to go check out the apartment I had been emailing the owner about.  We were looking for Campo del moro, a park and we ended up coming across el Palacio Real (the royal palace) and Catedral de la Almudena (the adjacent cathedral) which are two of the must see tourist attractions in Madrid.   A nice Spanish lady also gave us the rundown on the royal family, the president, a brief history since Franco, and the news that Prince William is getting married on April 29.  


Then we continued strolling along and came across the metro station we needed, where we also found some churros con chocolate and a mall.  We got on the metro and took it to Lucero, where our potential future apartment is.  Google maps was faithful again and led us directly to the apartment.  The lady who lives there showed us the place, which is small but nice.  The lady is extremely sweet.  Her name is Mia and I guess her to be in her 60s.  She seems like she would be happy to have Bree and I as roommates.


Then we walked around the Lucero area to get a feel for the place and we found a Residencia de Mayores (a home of the elderly) and a Catholic mass going on, so we went in.  Then we got back on the metro and decided to get off at a different station that we knew to also be close to our hostel.  We walked in a direction that we weren't sure was correct and found out it was wrong, so we turned back down a different street and ended up right by our hostel.  We pretty much have the whole city figured out by now.  We bought some lunch meat and bread and "made" dinner.


Pretty successful first two days if you ask me.  Now it's time for bed so I can get up for my first day of classes tomorrow.  Thanks for all the prayers!